Creaking dams and flooding rivers add to China quake fears

Chinese quake rescuers struggled with flooded rivers and dams in danger of collapse threatening to add to the devastation today.

Nearly 2,000 soldiers marched to the rapidly spreading Tangjiashan lake in Beichuan county, each carrying a rucksack of explosives to blast away debris causing the waters to back up.

The lake is two miles upstream from the centre of Beichuan county where thousands of refugees have been relocated.

Thunderstorms were also forecast for parts of Sichuan adding to the risks by putting even more pressure on dams and reservoirs weakened by the quake.

The storms herald the start of the summer rainy season that accounts for more than 70% of the two feet of rain that falls on the area each year.

The backed-up lake is one of several dozen in Sichuan.

In Anxian country, about 30 miles to the south of Beichuan, a landslide blocked the Chaping river, submerging Shuangdian village.

Residents say the lake has been rising by more than eight feet a day.

“The water was covering the road, and two days later I could not see the roof of my house anymore,” said Liu Zhongfu, 31, a truck driver whose house overlooks the new lake. A sofa and bits of wood that were once part of homes could be seen floating among the debris in the milky green water.

Liu was working away from home when the earthquake hit. His wife, three-month-old daughter and 60-year-old mother were all unhurt.

“I thought I could go back but I have nothing now. My village, it’s all become a sea,” he said.

Water there was backed up two miles along the river, said Wang Li, county Communist Party secretary.

“We need to take care of this soon, this is a serious situation,” he said.

Elsewhere, 600 people were voluntarily evacuated from Guanzhuang in Qingchuan county because of landslide worries.

“There’s no danger for this exact moment from flooding but we are very worried because the whole mountain is loose,” said a local official.

Problems with dams and reservoirs from the earthquake and its aftershocks have also been reported in other provinces.

The Water Resources Ministry said that three small reservoirs in Shaanxi province, just north of Sichuan, were in danger of collapse after the strong aftershock Sunday. A total 2,383 reservoirs were in danger across the country, the ministry said.

Two weeks after the earthquake struck Sichuan province, the confirmed death toll rose to 65,080 with 23,150 people still missing, the government said.The final number of dead was expected to exceed 80,000. China’s top Communist Party leaders said relief efforts should now focus more on resettlement and reconstruction, but that work to find survivors should not stop.

The shift was announced at a meeting of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China’s Central Committee presided over by President Hu Jintao.

Many of the dead from the disaster were children prompting officials to relax the country’s strict one-child policy.

Sichuan officials announced today that families whose child was killed, severely injured or disabled in the quake could get a certificate to have another child.